somewhat dimmed the memory of his boyhood's love, and neither he nor
Olga alluded to their early romance.

For six years the two had been friends, although they never saw each
other alone. Karl was a frequent visitor at their house and Herman was
his devoted and loyal friend. Olga honestly believed that she loved her
husband and had long ago forgotten her love for Karl. Lately she had
interested herself in his future to the extent of proposing for him a
bride, Elsa Berg, a beautiful and youthful heiress, and she had arranged
a grand ball, to be given so that the two young people might be brought
together.

In all the six years of her married life Olga had never visited Karl's
studio. Karl had never even offered to paint her portrait. Although
neither would confess it, some secret prompting made them fear to break
down the barriers of convention, and they remained to each other
chaperoned and safe. On this evening, however, when Karl was with them,
the subject of a portrait of Olga came up for the first time, and Herman
declared that it must be painted.

"She is more beautiful than any of your models or your patrons," he said
to Karl.

Olga was strangely disturbed, she could not tell why. She blushed and
looked at Karl, whom the proposition seemed to excite to strange
eagerness. She did not trust herself to speak, but listened to the
artist and her husband.

Neither Olga nor Karl could have defined the strange, conflicting
emotions with which they separately received Herman's proposition.
Unwillingly Olga's mind traveled swiftly back to the old days and her
girlhood, and she recalled the day of Karl's departure, the day he took
her in his arms and kissed her lips and said:

"I love you, Olga; I will not forget."

The memory thrilled her and the color flamed into her cheeks. Karl
looked at her, so enraptured and absorbed that he could scarcely give
attention to Herman, who rattled on about the portrait. It was finally
settled that the first sitting should be the following day at Karl's
studio, where Olga would be left with him alone.

It was there that Olga was then to encounter the materialization of the
impulses she had been, only half unconsciously, struggling against for
six years; the spirit of evil purpose against which good contends; the
incarnation of the arch fiend in the attractive shape of a suave,
polished, plausible, eloquent man of the world, whose cynicism bridged
the years of married life; whose